1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an RFID tag access authentication system and an RFID tag access authentication method. More particularly, the present invention relates to an authentication system for accessing of a recording medium such as a Radio Frequency Identification (hereinafter referred to as RFID) tag attached to a product.
2. Description of the Related Art
A modern distribution system is based on mass production and mass consumption. In this system, a product produced in a factory has a product lifecycle to be recycled. That is, firstly, the product is produced in a production part of the product lifecycle. Then, the product is shipped from the production part to a distribution part of the product lifecycle, such as a warehouse. Next, the product is placed on the market in a sales and service part of the product lifecycle. Then, the sold product is collected as a used product, and is discarded to be recycled in a discarding and recycling part of the product lifecycle. Each of the product lifecycles (mainly, the production part, the distribution part, the sales and service part, and the discarding and recycling part) comes to be varied corresponding to widening and enlarging of the distribution market of the product and varying products.
Especially, it is getting mainstream that the manufacturers have to be responsible for the products in last phase of the product lifecycle, as rising needs by the distribution market caring for environment issues, even in the distribution part related to collecting, discarding and recycling used product. Therefore, it is essentially important for the manufacturers supplying the products to the market to manage data of the products in each part of the product lifecycle.
As an example of a method for managing the product lifecycle, a technique for managing the product lifecycle by using an RFID tag attached to a product is disclosed in the Japanese Laid Open Patent Application (JP2000-48066). In this technique, an RFID tag, which memorizes data of a product, is attached to the product. Then, by reading out the data from the RFID tag, a state of the product is ascertained. In this technique, a lifecycle database to manage the product lifecycle is provided at each distribution hub. Data more detailed than that memorized in the RFID tag is stored in the database.
The data stored in the database are related to the data memorized in the RFID tag to be organized in order to manage the data. Each of the databases is provided to corresponding ones of a production control system of a manufacture, marketing management systems of distributors, marketing management systems of retailers, service management systems of companies dealing with maintenance and services, and management systems of the discarding/recycling companies. These plural databases are connected each other by network so as to refer to each data. In this conventional method for managing the product lifecycle, these companies collaborate with each other in the data regarding the products.
The product data in the database provided in each system hub are managed only by a product ID. An information terminal connected with the network can access the database at any place in the network by using the product ID. In this way, the data in the database provided in each system hub can be effectively utilized without any geographic or time constraints.
A person who knows the product ID to access the database can freely access the data of the product stored in the database. In order to utilize the data in the database more effectively in each system hub, it is necessary to improve security level such as an access restriction wherein only the person who registers his/her personal data can access the database. As a method to improving of the security level, it is well known that a right of writing data in the recording medium is permitted only after the authentication of a person by an ID and a password.
A person authentication by an ID and a password exerts its effect on data communication using data terminals connected with a network. In such case, only a password holder has responsibility for a password management. This password management, that is one password is managed by one person, excels in the light of prevention of data leakage. Therefore, it is desired that the management responsibility of a security manager will be reduced, keeping the same security protection effect as that of the method wherein one password is managed by one person.